Clearwater Business

The Clearwater area is a local business hub with diversified business activities. In the Downtown Clearwater area including its immediate surroundings, there are over a thousdan active businesses. Businesses in Clearwater includes high tech industries, financial firms, hospitals, restaurants, light industrial, and retail outlets. In the core downtown area there are over a thousand people employed with business firms.

Spark

Clearwater Business SPARK is a network of resources provided by our partners to support businesses and entrepreneurs in every stage of development so that you may easily identify and obtain the resources you need to grow in the greater Clearwater area.

Travel Industry

The travel infrastructure of Tampa Bay is considerable in Florida and is regarded as the key to business development in the region. With over 20 major airlines and more than 20 million passengers served every year, Tampa International Airport is the largest in the region. Additionally, Sarasota-Bradenton International Airport and St. Petersburg-Clearwater International Airport play a significant role in catering to the air traffic needs of the region.

The port of Tampa has played a vital role in the economy of Tampa Bay area. Hosting a strong shipping industry in the area, the Port of Tampa caters to over half of Florida’s cargo in the modes of container, refrigerator, ro-ro, bulk, and break bulk, employing many 10s of thousands of people. The Port of Manatee, and The Port of St. Petersburg are also very near to Clearwater area.

In addition to the extensive roadways in the area, a continuous improvement plan is always in progress targeting some of the most important interchanges, connectors, overpasses and express highways.

Tourism

Being a popular tourist destination, there is a great deal of development in the Clearwater area amusement industry. The region boasts of many amusement and theme parks, gardens, zoos, libraries and museums.

Avionics, Marine and Defense Electronics

Tampa Bay region is a reputed support center in the fields of homeland security, avionics and marine electronic industries. The Center for Ocean Technology at the University of South Florida is one of the champions of research and development in MEMS used for gathering bio-chemical data for supervising water quality. In addition, the miniature robots of the USF’s Center for Robot-Assisted Search are finding increase interest and uses. The United States Central Command is housed in Tampa Bay and manages military operations in Iraq, Afghanistan and Middle East countries.

Business and Information Services

More than one fourth of the Florida state’s business and information service companies are hosted in Tampa Bay. The diverse interests of these firms extend into financial services, informational technology services, and professional services like law companies, accounting firms, engineering companies, consulting firms and others. In addition, Tampa Bay is the gateway to the High Tech Corridor of Florida with a range of information technology companies and business service firms assisting the companies in the region with advanced information technology needs.

Financial Services

Considering the scope and size of the financial services industry in the region, Tampa Bay is a significant financial center in the southeast. The financial services cluster of this area is the largest in the state of Florida. Several reputed and leading global players in the field of financial service have established their presence in the region like JPMorgan Chase, Progressive Insurance, Raymond James Financial, Citigroup, Deposit Trust & Clearing Corporation, Metlife, USAA, State Farm, and Franklin Templeton to name a few.

Education, Technology and Research

Clearwater area is a home for cutting-edge educational and research activity in the field of technology. A number of research centers in the region have engaged themselves in scientific research and transfer of technology for commercial usage and application in the market place. An extensive online distance education, technical institutes, healthcare training institutes, and industrial training firms are engaged in extending the scope of education in to several applied fields across industry verticals.

Nanotechnology and Microelectronics

Some of the top research firms in the area like the University of South Florida's Nanomaterials and Nano-manufacturing Research Center (NNRC), the Center for Ocean Technology at USF's College of Marine Science, and H. Lee Moffitt Cancer Center have accomplished great feats in the areas of drug dispensing, customized laser microchips, mechanized microsurgery, solar power production, water purification, cancer treatment, design and development of marine sensors using micro electro mechanical systems (MEMS), and nanotube hydrogen storage.

Manufacturing Industries

The high tech manufacturing cluster of the Tampa Bay region is diverse and versatile. The major manufacturing activities of the region extend into food processing and packaging, defense and pharmaceuticals, medical devices and microelectronics. The region ranks high among leading medical device manufacturing clusters of the country. Clearwater area is home to many medical device manufacturers and suppliers, producers of health-care related components, pharmaceutical firms and medical device manufacturers and suppliers.

Healthcare

The Tampa Bay region a considerable number of hospitals, clinics and ambulatory care centers to serve the area population. Many thousands physicians and tens of thousands of nurses provide personalized medical care in the area.

Shopping Malls

Clearwater has two shopping malls including Countryside Mall and Clearwater Mall and Bay Area Outlet Mall.

Downtown Clearwater Business area